Max 2 The Max
by Rogue Angel2
Summary: Max Guevera meets Max Evans.


"Max 2 the Max"  
  
Rogue Angel  
  
Disclaimer: People I have no affiliation with own the names, rights, and property of Roswell and Dark Angel. I just make this look good. :-) The ideas are mine. Summary: Long before ever coming to Seattle, Max Guevera had a special connection with one of the citizens of Roswell, New Mexico. A brief but intense bond between two people with dark secrets. Spoilers/Timeframe: A couple years before Dark Angel starts, Max is 16. Roswell Max is 16 also and this is just before the pilot episode. Rating: PG 13 A/N: I had to tweak the stories a bit. Roswell now is in Dark Angel Time. And I know that Max Evans and Liz first hook up when they're sixteen, but I'm changing that but just a bit... Which is an upside of doing fan fic... OH AND BY THE WAY.... This is in NO WAY connected to Can't Deny Destiny.  
  
*****  
  
It was like every two bit town I had ever been through. The same faces walked the same streets everyday, and they didn't have a problem with that. They were content to live in this repetitive pattern. I never could live like that, in the same place for too long. I'd go crazy and besides, it's not exactly safe for me to stay here. It's not safe for me to stay anywhere or to be anywhere for that matter.  
  
It'd been seven years since we ran. I'd been all over this shattered country and I'd seen nothing that gives me any sign of faith. And all I could do is give in to the shark in my DNA and keep moving, hoping against hope that I'd find one of them, one of my siblings. I think that was the worst part. The empty, alone feeling I had in the pit of my stomach. If I had found out that I was it, that my falling into the ice and being driven to safety by Hannah was the only way any of us made it, I don't know what I would have done. Would it be worth the fight? To see Jondy or Ben or Zack and have them looking at me down the length of a barrel as they order me to go back... It would have been too much. I'm a strong girl, I won't lie... But I'm not that strong.  
  
The bell rang and I sat in the class. It felt awkward. Flashes of memories from my childhood flooded into my head. I found myself sitting up straight with my hands flat on my desk, the feeling that I had slid into that position naturally scared me. I quickly pulled my hands back and slumped in my chair.  
  
My heart started racing and my mind started asking questions. "What was I doing here?" The only answer for that was boredom. I am so tired of menial jobs. You can't get any good jobs till your eighteen. You'd think with America being a third world country that a very capable sixteen year old could walk in anywhere and get a minimum wage job. Oh no. It doesn't work that way. Stupid child labor laws. My days stretch out. I don't sleep much or often and not working just adds the hours.  
  
Something then caught my attention, a scent or a feeling... I don't know. I still can't explain it but I looked up and saw him. A tall boy, strong build but not too strong, dark unkempt hair that brushed his forehead, and the eyes.... Eyes that were dark and penetrating. I looked away. It felt like he could look in my eyes and see everything.  
  
I glanced back up at him and he notice me looking. He smiled and sat down in the chair next to mine. For a second I thought that he could be a brother... Zane maybe or if Zack dyed his hair... No, it wasn't Zack. That boy, with those eyes, is not Zack. But he wasn't like any guy I'd ever seen before.  
  
He looked over again, and I was still staring. He leaned over to me. "Hi."  
  
"Hi," I managed to croak... My mind started racing, "How close am I to my heat cycle?... Please don't let me be close."  
  
He cleared his throat. "I'm Max."  
  
I laughed. "Seriously? My name is Max too."  
  
He smiled. "If you're Max Evans then we're really in trouble."  
  
"Guevera."  
  
"Well, Max Guevera, are you new?"  
  
"Yeah."  
  
"Where are you from?"  
  
I was almost tempted to say Manticore, I paused for only a second. My mind stopped working on me. "Here and there."  
  
"Parents move around a lot?"  
  
"I never knew my parents," I said. I've never been that honest with anyone.  
  
"I'm sorry."  
  
"It's ok."  
  
Max looked to the door as a thin, frail looking brunette entered the class. They exchanged a glance for a moment. Max sighed. It struck me then, he was into her. I cleared my throat and brought Max back into the real world.  
  
"So what do all of you do for fun around here?" I asked.  
  
"What? Oh. Uh, well there's the Roswell Crash festival which has been going on forever but isn't for another few weeks, or there's a cafe called Crashdown. Everything there has an alien theme but so is everything else in this town."  
  
"And this town can still afford to do that, even after the Pulse?" I asked.  
  
Max got a little nervous, for just a second, I never would have caught it without my advanced senses. "Yeah. Who needs working utilities when you can have a water bottle in the shape of an alien."  
  
"So this town's into aliens?" I asked.  
  
"Something like that."  
  
"Do you believe in aliens?" I asked.  
  
He never got to answer that question, the teacher finally arrived and started the class.  
  
After class I started walking down the hall towards my next class. I didn't need the education, I knew everything so far, but I need the distraction.  
  
And I was very distracted until I heard a guy shout out. "Max."  
  
I turned and saw a tall blond guy with spikey hair walk up to Max. They started walking together towards me. I turned and started walking away as fast as I could.  
  
"Hey," Max's voice rang out.  
  
I stopped and looked. He was acknowledging me so I smiled. "Hey yourself."  
  
"Max, this is my friend Michael Guerin. Michael, this is Max Guevera."  
  
"Hi," I replied.  
  
"Right," Michael said. He then turned his back to me and talked to Max. "Maxwell, can you get your dad's car tonight?"  
  
"I have the jeep."  
  
"So, we're on?"  
  
"Yeah."  
  
"Ok," Michael said and then walked off.  
  
"Nice friends," I said with a bit too much sarcasm.  
  
"He's... He's just like that. He doesn't trust anyone."  
  
"I know guys like that," I said.  
  
"You do?"  
  
"Yeah, well at least they were like that when we were kids but time changes people."  
  
"Yeah, it does."  
  
A tall blond girl walked up to Max, she had a lot of power in her stride. Something about her made me think of Jondy. I don't know what it was.  
  
She smiled as she came up. "Max."  
  
"Izzy. Hi. Isabel, this is Max Guevera. It's her first day."  
  
"Nice to meet you. I'm Max's sister. Isabel."  
  
"Nice to meet you," I responded. Isabel waited, as if she had something to tell Max. "I've got to go. I'll see you around," I said and walked off.  
  
"Yeah," Max said with a slight husk in his voice.  
  
"Max. Michael said you guys are going again tonight," Isabel said.  
  
I slowed my stride and then ducked out of their line of sight. I honed in on my advanced hearing and listened in.  
  
"Yeah, we are going tonight," Max said in a hushed voice.  
  
"What do you expect to find?" Isabel responded.  
  
"Anything," Max responded.  
  
"2016 minus 1949 is how much again?"  
  
"Sixty-seven," Max replied dejectedly.  
  
"It's been sixty-seven years. People were combing the desert long before the Pulse woke us up," Isabel whispered. "They've found what we have. NOTHING."  
  
I tried to absorb what they were saying. Something about a lost object in the desert from 1949. And something about being asleep until the Pulse.  
  
I realized that they had stopped talking and I ran to my next class. Seconds after I sat down, Max entered the class. He saw me and smiled.  
  
"You. Again," he said as he took the seat in front of me.  
  
"And you. I might like this place after all," I said. I never actually meant to say it but I did.  
  
"Two Max's got to stick together."  
  
"At least for two periods," I said with a grin.  
  
He smiled and turned around. His neck stared at me. His bare, barcode free neck stared at me. It wasn't Zane. I mean there is a chance he got the tattoo removed but they come back after two months and they hurt a lot to get them removed. Besides, I think I'm older than Max as is and Zane's older than me.  
  
Something nagged within me. Curiosity killed the cat, right? I pulled out a piece of paper and scrawled a note on it. What did you lose?  
  
I handed it to him. He opened it and he paused for a second. He handed me the note back. A large question mark was below my question.  
  
I wrote a second question. In the desert. From 1949.  
  
He opened the note and sat up straight. He crumpled the note and tossed it in his backpack. He wrote me a quick message on a separate piece of paper and handed it to me.  
  
Meet me by the brown jeep in student parking after this class.  
  
The rest of the class, he seemed jumpy. He was very nervous about something. The bell rang and he slowly began packing up his bag. I bent over to close my bag and he grabbed my wrist. His eyes seemed to tell me to wait.  
  
He got up and headed out of the class. I followed a few seconds later.  
  
When we met up in the parking lot. He was very nervous. "Get in."  
  
"What?" I asked.  
  
"In," he ordered. I raised my eyebrows in disbelief. He resigned. "Please."  
  
I got in and he started driving. He drove all the way out of town, avoiding all but two sector check points. He drove out to the desert and then he started driving off road. We were far from the road before he stopped the car. He unbuckled his seat belt.  
  
"What do you know?" he ordered.  
  
"Nothing. Just what I overheard."  
  
"What was that?"  
  
"What you talked to your sister about."  
  
"You don't know anything?"  
  
"No. What's wrong? Are you in danger? If you are, I can help."  
  
"Help? How can you help?"  
  
"I'm on the run myself." The words were out before I could stop them.  
  
We looked into each others eyes for a while. He finally looked down. "Why are you running?"  
  
"You wouldn't believe me if I told you," I said with a laugh.  
  
"Whatever we say will stay between us. We'll die without telling a soul about the other person's whatever."  
  
"Can you do that?" I asked.  
  
"Can you?" he retorted.  
  
"Yes. I swear."  
  
"I swear also."  
  
After a long, awkward silence, I spoke, "I was created in a lab as a perfect soldier. The program was called Manticore. They mixed animal and human DNA to make me. I have seizures and go into heat phases because of the way I was made. In 2009, before the Pulse, I escaped from Manticore. The others ran with me. I don't know if any of them made it. I have a barcode. Everyday I live with the fear of going back and being dissected and studied some more."  
  
Without a second's hesitation Max began to speak, "I'm an alien. I'm not from Earth. I have human DNA in me so I'm human enough but I'm not. Michael and Isabel are like me too. Our ship crashed in 1949 and we were in hibernation pods that stayed active until the Pulse. Something shorted out the system and we woke up soon after. If anyone ever found out about us, we'd be studied and or killed."  
  
"I've never told anyone that," I said.  
  
"Me neither," Max replied.  
  
"Maybe we just needed to get it off of our chests.," I suggested.  
  
"Maybe. Or maybe there's something more."  
  
"More?" I asked.  
  
"I think we have kindred souls. Two Max's both not entirely human but not anything else specifically. We're both fighting to stay free," he said.  
  
"Yeah." I smiled.  
  
"Can I see it?" he asked after a brief silence.  
  
"My barcode?" I turned around and showed him my barcode. "The brand I bear."  
  
"I could take it off, if you want,," Max said.  
  
"How?"  
  
"I have powers..."  
  
"Please."  
  
I turned around in my seat and he put his hand on the back of my neck. There was a small burning sensation, then a prickling, and then both sensations grew and grew. "Ow. Stop. Max. Stop."  
  
He pulled his hand back. "It's still there."  
  
"It's part of my DNA. I tried to get it removed once and it felt like acid and sandblasting... Not a fun sensation."  
  
"I wouldn't think so."  
  
I moved my leg and something jammed into my hip. I moved and pulled out my knife. I kept it around for safe keeping and I had completely forgotten about that.  
  
"You carry a knife around?" Max asked.  
  
"The government knows who I am. But I don't actually use it." I looked up at him. "Let me see your palm."  
  
"Why?"  
  
"Come on."  
  
Max finally resigned and gave me his hand. I opened my knife and cut him. He winced and clenched his hand. I slashed my own palm and then clasped my hand with his. "Now you and I, we can't tell about the other person's secret."  
  
"We'd be telling on our own," he said.  
  
We pulled our hands back and he covered his cut palm with his other hand and healed the wound. He reached for my hand. "I want the scar," I said.  
  
He showed me his palm, his scar was evident. "So do I."  
  
He cupped my hand with his and healed my wound.  
  
"If you ever really need me, I'll come back." I said.  
  
"You're leaving?" he asked with a hurt voice.  
  
"I have too. If I stay here, I risk you. And I can't do that. Even if I think I'd get along here or if we..."  
  
"Even if we what?"  
  
"I can't stay because if I do, something will develop between us and you don't want that."  
  
"What makes you say that?"  
  
"The brunette from first period..."  
  
"Liz. Liz Parker."  
  
"Yeah, whatever. You seem to like her."  
  
"I do."  
  
"Us being together would just be a curse. I mean a transgenic and an extra- terrestrial... Could you imagine the wedding guests?"  
  
Max held back a laugh. "Someone's going to be really lucky to love you."  
  
We looked at each other for a second and then kissed. It was a deep kiss. We broke apart and looked at each other.  
  
Without a word, Max started his jeep up and he drove us back into town. The next day I didn't go to school. I spent the day trying to steal sector passes from the Roswell Sheriff's office. It took me a while to actually leave.  
  
I read in the paper, a week later, that Liz had been shot at in the cafe Max had talked about. Max was one of the witnesses there. I wonder if she was actually shot and he rescued her or what. I hope it worked out for him.  
  
I still think of Max Evans from Roswell. His eyes that pulled honesty from my soul. I could never have lied to him. Sometimes I wish I would have stayed. I would have been lucky to love a guy like him. I love Logan but not like I loved Max. Logan's the love of my life and Max, he's like my soul mate, the one person who knows what I'm thinking before I do. I know we never would have made it but it's nice to dream. But that's the great part about it, I could dream that we would have worked out just fine. We had a connection between us, one I've never duplicated. When I sit on the Space Needle, I look up at the stars, rub the scar on my palm, and I let my mind drift to him. The empty and alone feeling at the pit of my stomach goes away as I remember that day. I wonder if he thinks of me. I've often thought of going back, just to watch from a distance, to see he's ok. But somehow, I know he is. I've gotten bad feelings but they've all gone away. Someday our paths will cross again. Until then, Mr. Max Evans, I wish you love.  
  
The End 


End file.
